Posted on 04/05/2002 7:31:48 PM PST by Registered
I dislike the stupid "trade them aid in exchange for them NOT doing something" approach which, unfortunately, the US has followed since 1994 even up to the present day. It is the same principle, IMHO, that has fouled up US agriculture. We pay farmers NOT to grow things. So we turned farmers into welfare recipients when they should have been exploring new ways to exploit markets. Worse, North Korea is as belligerent as ever, and I believe our giving them aid prolongs the misery of their people. It's not the first time the US has done exaclty that. It seems the government bureaucrats are afraid N. Korea might collapse and if it did we'd have on this nuclear material floating about on the world market. Maybe so, but maybe not. If N. Korea collapsed, those folks might get their butts right in gear and prove us all wrong. I would prefer our knowitall government employees would not prolong the regime, and would prefer that this administration not follow the policy of making it linger. It was, after al, the same mentality which led to our leaving Hussein in power, for fear of someone worse or for fear of Iran filling the void. I think we could have prevented Iran from injecting itself if we had a desire to do so. Letting Hussein kill more people and fund more terrorist activities doesn't look so smart to me.
I've learned a bit more on digging though this junk.
Here's an overview report from a conference via the CIA which gives the various chain of thoughts our bureaucrats have in mind, some conflicting:
That Bush is Clinton reborn?
KEDO is composed of the US, EU, Japan, and South Korea, with Japan and South Korea providing the bulk of the funding. KEDO has been constructing the light water reactors to replace reactors the North was using which could produce nuclear waste material since its formation in the mid 90s. The North was supposed to turn over spent rods from its old reactors. Because of lack of cooperation with the verification requirement, KEDO has consistantly refused to complete construction. Just funding KEDO will not neccessarily mean that no verification will be required, since KEDO has been requiring verification all along and since KEDO has essentially been funded all along by Japan and South Korea.
(If we have lifted verification requirements then someone should certainly be in trouble. Ol' Congressman Hyde might be ticked too. Hyde's offices might be able to confirm the accuracy of these reports and provide information not filtered through the press on any wacko policy changes. With the administration's recent statements regarding Korea, I have to wonder what it up here too.)
Source for Hyde's comments below
Remarks of Chairman Henry J. Hyde
To the American Enterprise Institute
Conference On North Korea
March 13, 2001
... So long as the North Koreans view verification as a problem, as something to be resisted, we can only suspect that there has been no break with the past, and no commitment to genuine cooperation in the future. And if there has been no break with the past, President Bush's insistence on verification will make it very unlikely that the nuclear reactors will ever be completed in North Korea.
This is because, under the terms of the Agreed Framework, the reactors are not to be completed until North Korea and the IAEA resolve the dispute that gave rise to the crisis in the first place. Either the IAEA must be persuaded that its measurements were wrong, or North Korea has to admit that it has been misleading the world for years and reveal the full extent of its nuclear weapons program. If neither of these things happens, and we continue to insist on verification, then under the terms of the Agreed Framework the reactors should not be completed.
Indeed, I would go so far as to predict that if the Administration continues to insist on strict verification -- as I expect it will -- we will not have to ask the North Koreans to substitute conventional power plants for the nuclear plants, because eventually they will ask us to make this change.
I have two additional concerns about any missile agreement with North Korea that should be taken into account. To the degree any such deal involves the launching of satellites for North Korea, we need to make sure there is no technology transfer. The purpose of any such agreement would be to terminate North Korea's missile program, not to run a seminar for them on how to build missiles and launch payloads into space. But if such an agreement were not structured properly, it could easily become a seminar for them, just as our space launch activities in China helped upgrade Beijing's missile capability.
In addition, I worry a great deal about the compensation that North Korea is demanding in connection with an agreement on missile proliferation. Reportedly they have said we need to pay them $1 billion per year to stop proliferating.
I understand that this may just be an opening position in a negotiation, and it is unclear what the source of such funds would be. Additionally, North Korea has demanded reparations from Japan as a precondition to normalizing diplomatic relations. Such reparations could ultimately total in the billions of dollars. Also, there is the prospect of lending from international financial institutions.
Access to any of these sources of money could effectively guarantee the survival of the North Korean regime. We need to carefully consider the implications of allowing the West to become the principal prop holding up the North Korean regime.
-Hyde
--Excerpt from the ORIGINAL DRAFT of George W. Bush's State of The Union Address September 20, 2001
Were that true, American Indian cultures would have all been as nasty and abusive as these regimes. (Some were, most were not.) Yet by and large the lifestyle of the Cherokee and certain other tribes was so attractive that many people, preferring more freedom, left white civilization to join them. Ultimately societies fused, with people from one culture adopting what they saw as best in the other culture and adding it to their own ways. In terms of material wealth, they all had less than do some members of societies like the palestinian people, the Chinese, even the Afghans under the Taliban. Bushmen in Africa practicing traditional lifestyles have less material wealth than many of these modern regimes, but do not have the misery we find in modern regimes, if left alone.
So what then was is the problem ?
For the most part, you don't have to look much further than Marx for the answer.
You see, these allegedly more primitive societies still have things that a marxist society does not. For one, they have more individual liberty, even if some of that is limited by tradition. You were free to walk away from the tribe or nation at your own risk. Marxist or theocratic extremist regimes, on the other hand, have this thing against letting people leave or letting some people be different.
Another thing is that marxism exaggerates the differences between classes; it does so in order to create class warfare, which is neccessary to ultimately eliminate the upper classes and the chronically poor to establish what they hope will be a classless society full of community spirit. But instead, it creates jealousy and conflict and selfishness. Free cultures, even primitive ones, tend to inspire in people a sense of generosity, and people not exposed to marxism are more likely to blame themselves for their failures and setbacks than to blame someone else's success. That means it is possible to be happy even in poverty because you always have a reason to believe you can improve your lot. And you can, because you can change your conditions if you just get out there and start doing it.
Marxist societies further try to deny people religion, considering it an opiate that stands in the way of socialist revolution. They are right in that religion- if it is of the sort which preaches self-responsibility- does stand in opposition to socialist revolution. But the socialists are wrong to call it an opiate. It was called an opiate because people who had religion and a spirit of self-responsibility didn't feel outraged at being poor or middle class while others had more. Marxists think of this as a sort of blissful ignorance. In reality, individuals are largely responsible for their behavior and their successes and failures, and the ones on drugs are the marxists who delude themselves about who is to blame for the failure of communism, who is to blame for poverty, etc.
Dealing with poverty without reestablishing the idea of individual responsibility won't work. Dealing with poverty without dealing with the root cause, the marxism, will if anything promote more poverty and create even more dependence. The marxists at the top have to be routed out or convinced to lay off of their propaganda to enable change back to a society of responsibility to take place; but they are not inclined to do so because they know their abused populations would like to have their head on a platter, and they know that if they just hand on they will be fat and happy like they never would if they stepped down. So your idea of education is great, but it is difficult to do in a closed society and reading labels on trade goods isn't enough. If the education is like what we see in palestine, then forget it... they can read arabic and do math, but their minds have been so twisted they are going to be huge problems for years to come. Good education in math and science took place under foul openly marxist regimes, but made them no freer. Literacy was in many cases high, but there wasn't anything to read. So the message of responsibility and opportunity for those who try doesn't get out.
Restraints must be dropped on the press. North Korea is unfortunately very closed off to external information and the heavy handed marxism snuffs out the hope of their people, which no doubt reduces their productivity and causes other societal problems. The sense that individuals cannot effect change reinforces the regime by preventing potential dissenters from spreading their ideas. People just quit trying, and things keep getting worse.
But maybe, just maybe there is some reasonable explanation for this inexcusable behavior.
I guess we can't count on the mainstream media to break this story, how 'bout drudge? Call your favorite talk radio this weekend, or Monday...Get this story out there!
I want him to make an attempt at explaining himself on this one. If he can't, or won't (which is what I suspect will happen) He leaves me no choice but to abandon him for good. There can be no other alternative, can there?
Can we continue to support a man (and an administration) who is with the terrorists?
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